From workshops to bar takeovers, panels and more, we chat to Shirley Yeung about MixHaus.
Shirley Yeung is a pretty familiar face here at Dan’s Daily, not only for her ingenious cocktail collabs (like the Pink Paradise and Salted Chocolated Oldie) but for her work across the hospitality industry. She manages Foxtrot Unicorn, working across their three excellent venues in WA (no small feat), while co-running MixHaus – a not-for-profit community group for female-identifying members of the hospitality industry.
If you’ve found yourself reading this, then no doubt you’re already aware of some of the frustrations felt by women working across all levels of hospo. Shirley (pictured top right) and her co-founder Pippa Canavan (top left) wanted to use their power, their networks and the weight of community activism to make the changes they'd longed to see throughout their own bartending careers. Enter MixHaus – a group whose core missions lie in showcasing the brilliant talent that might otherwise go unheralded, providing completely free education and opening pathways for women to grow and progress.
Three years on and they’ve achieved a hell of a lot in their efforts to make sure women in hospitality are seen, heard and recognised. The last year has seen the launch of a resource library for women, in addition to their regular bar takeovers, wine education scholarships, and workshops, plus a much-deserved Industry Leadership Award in the 2024 West Australian Good Food Guide Awards. Impressive – but even more so when you consider they do all of this in their spare time (few and far between when you’re busy running thriving venues) and just how much more they have on the cards for the years to come.
We sat down with Shirley to chat all things MixHaus, representation and how she’s working to create safe, sustainable spaces for women in hospo to learn and network.
Talk to us about MixHaus. How did it start?
“So, MixHaus was a COVID project with my friend and co-founder Pippa Canavan. We’ve been friends for a long time, and we actually started talking about something like MixHaus a good 12 months before launching in March 2021. It started as a passion born out of frustration.”
What were you finding so frustrating?
“We would constantly go to masterclasses, tastings, trainings and a lot of brand events, and we would usually be the only two women in a room full of men, and we asked ourselves why. Between us, we had so many friends that were women in the industry, so many female bartenders and…we're like, where are they? Why don't they want to come? It just highlighted a bigger problem.
“I’ve been really fortunate in my career. Even though I have had mostly male managers, they’ve always been really supportive of everything that I've wanted to do – cocktail competitions and progression-wise – and I now realise that’s a very rare thing. So Pip and I, we were like, we’re both in positions of power, we’re both managing venues, and we have good relationships with a lot of brands. Why don't we build a community of some sort here in WA for female-identifying bartenders and create a safe space to have open discussions about topics that aren't normally discussed? Let's have training and workshops that are exclusively for women.
“I remember being a 21-year-old, it was so intimidating in those whisky trainings. I remember thinking, I don’t want to put my hand up and ask what the difference is between rye, bourbon and Scotch. I don’t want to ask the ’silly’ questions because I was so intimidated by that room. So, one of the goals of having our tastings, workshops and trainings was to create that open and safe space for women to ask those questions regardless of how basic the question is.
“A big part of our ethos is always obviously putting women’s hospitality first and foremost, but we always try and give back to women in the industry as well. So, all our events that we host are either at female-owned, operated or managed venues. We try to use female photographers and creators who are women as well.”
What was your first event and how has it grown from there?
“We held our first fundraiser in March 2021 on International Women’s Day and raised thousands of dollars just from the WA community. That first event’s goal was to help kick us off and be able to put together free events and workshops for women to attend – our whole goal is to offer everything (like everything) we do for free. The fundraiser was a bar takeover format, so we had about four groups of all female teams and two additional groups of old-school bartenders, operators, and brand ambassadors go behind the bar. We had an auction that took place as well – lots of great brands and small businesses offered up gift vouchers, rare bottles of spirits, artwork, gift hampers, and so on – and we raised just over $15,000 from that one fundraiser. From that, all the money has gone into scholarships, workshops and trainings. It was nice to see the hospo community, and more broadly the WA community, show up and support the cause.
“MixHaus is structured in three categories. The first is the training and workshops. The second is networking and upskilling, offering scholarships as well. In the past two years, we’ve offered over 20 positions in wine with our local educator, who is also one of the most amazing sommeliers. It’s actually kickstarted so many women’s careers in wine and they’ve gone on to continue with all the other WSET levels and do their diplomas.
“And the third one we call our ‘party style’. This is fully open and inclusive to everyone. So things like female bar takeovers, events, long-table lunches and wider panel discussions. We really want to put women in the spotlight, so we open this one up for everyone.”
Are there plans to expand nationally?
“Yes, I would say we’ve been slowly expanding nationally already, and that kind of happened organically because of last year’s Sydney Bar Week where we did a female bar takeover event at Door Knock. That was our first national event and we didn’t really know how that would turn out, but it was great. There were lines out the door.
“We’ve done a few small launches in Victoria as well, which we’re hoping will pick up a bit more momentum. We’ve created groups in each state with girls on the ground running it. They’re like our eyes and ears in the city for us.
“We’ve also done some events up on the Gold Coast and some big ones in Brissie, too. The idea is to fund these bar takeovers and the profit goes back into the funding for that city in that state.”
Beyond the safe spaces of your events, how do you see MixHaus working to create safer workplaces?
“We will actually have two events at Sydney Bar Week this year. One is an all-female takeover, like last year. And the second event is quite different – a wide panel discussion. We’ve reached out to a few people both within and outside of the industry, like the Government Support Union, to talk about how to be a better ally. We saw a great opportunity to be able to offer resources and further support on what to do if something bad happens, how to talk to your manager, and, for operators and managers, how to actually combat and deal with it, because I don’t think it’s spoken about enough when you actually become a manager. You’re not taught one of the hardest things, which is how to manage people. If a staff member tells you about something like assault, you need to know how to deal with it.
“There are also a lot of women not wanting to speak up about it, so for us, we’re doing this panel to talk about the big elephant in the room. Because we know what happens, but what do we do after and how do we prevent these things from happening in the workplace to begin with?”
What advice do you give to women coming up through the industry?
“The best advice I can give is to find your people and spend the time finding your people because that’s when you are able to grow and prosper, and really become the best at what you do.”
And if people want to get in on the incredible work that MixHaus is doing, where can they find you?
“We are most active on our instagram or we can also be contacted via our website or email directly: [email protected]”
